I spent five years at Forbes writing about business and leadership, attracting nearly one million unique visitors to Forbes.com each month. While here, I assistant edited the annual World’s 100 Most Powerful Women package and helped launch and grow ForbesWoman.com. I've appeared on CBS, CNBC, MSNBC and E Entertainment and speak often at conferences and events on women's leadership topics. I graduated summa cum laude from New York University with degrees in journalism and sociology and was honored with a best in business award from the Society of American Business Editors and Writers (SABEW) in 2012. My work has appeared in Businessweek, Ladies’ Home Journal, The Aesthete and Acura Style. I live in New York City with my husband and can be found on Twitter @Jenna_Goudreau, Facebook, and Google+.

New Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer Is Pregnant. Does It Matter?

It was a whirlwind Monday for longtime Googler Marissa Mayer. The 37-year-old resigned by phone from her post as head of Local, Maps, and Location Services for Google, was publicly named the new chief of Yahoo—starting the very next day—and announced that she is six months pregnant. It’s a boy.

She joins a small-but-growing group of women leading major public companies in the U.S., pushing the number to 20 female CEOs out of 500, or 4%. However, she sets a precedent as the first woman to ever take the top position while pregnant. Will having her first baby impact her performance or perception as the strong leader that Yahoo desperately needs?

Mayer got the initial call from an executive recruiter hired by Yahoo in mid June. Legally, women don’t have to disclose a pregnancy and an employer can’t ask, but she chose to reveal the news to a member of the Yahoo search committee in a meeting in late June. She continued through several more rounds of interviews.

Mayer toldFortune that the Yahoo board seemed unconcerned about the pregnancy, saying, “They showed their evolved thinking.” She will be one of just two women on Yahoo’s current board, joining former Ernst & Young Partner Susan James, whose public record suggests is also a mother.

“It’s a risk,” says Deborah Kolb, author of women’s leadership book Her Place at the Table, noting that people size a leader up in three months—exactly the time she has until her due date. “Any outside leader coming into this type of role, especially at Yahoo with so much turnover, faces the challenge of establishing their legitimacy and vision. The pressure is on her to make her mark fast.”

Mayer succeeds a series of failed leaders at the company. Most recently, Scott Thompson was pushed out for lying about his credentials, and Carol Bartz got the boot with 16 months left on her four-year contract. “We have high regards for Ms. Mayer’s organizational skills, consumer Internet industry knowledge and her ability to focus efforts of a large team of engineers on product innovation,” saysCitigroup analyst Mark Mahaney in a report. “However, we think that Yahoo’s challenges are substantial.”

The troubled history puts an even brighter spotlight on Mayer, who says she plans to take a few weeks of maternity leave and work throughout it. “It is completely disruptive in the first weeks of having a newborn,” says Jane Waldfogel, professor of social work and public affairs at Columbia University and expert on work and family issues. “But after that there is plenty of high quality childcare available. In some ways, the early years are easier to manage than the later years, when children have more activities and less predictable schedules.”

There were likely many discussions between Mayer and her husband and with Yahoo leaders about how to make it work. Waldfogel believes that flexibility and technology should allow her to stay connected to both responsibilities. “They’re making an investment in her for the long-term,” she says. “She has a commitment that is well known in advance. She’ll be out for a couple weeks, and it should be no different than any other commitment.”

Charley Polachi, a partner at Polachi Access Search Partners who specializes in the global placement of C-level executives, calls Mayer’s pregnancy a “non-event,” saying that “motherhood is permanent, but pregnancy is temporary.”

Would we be talking about a male leader who was about to have a baby with his wife? Probably not, but Kolb says it’s really not the same. “There is something about motherhood,” she says. “When you have a first child, it changes your life in some way. It changes how you think about yourself. I don’t know how prepared she is.”

While new motherhood is rare for an incoming CEO, most female chiefs at major U.S. companies do have children. An analysis by Douglas Branson, a University of Pittsburgh law professor and author of The Last Male Bastion, shows that 90% are mothers and most have two or three kids.

It contradicts the notion that most women can’t have children and achieve senior leadership levels. Anne-Marie Slaughter, professor of politics and international affairs at Princeton University, recently revisited this question in her massive cover story for The Atlantic, “Why Women Still Can’t Have It All.” She was traveling today and couldn’t be reached but commented on Twitter whether Mayer would be able to “have it all.” Emphasizing that only some women can but that most will struggle, Slaughter wrote: “I applaud Marissa Mayer. But she proves my thesis: she’s superhuman, rich, & in charge. Hope she brings flexwork to Yahoo!”

Among the mothers Branson studied—albeit a small sample of 20 women—those that were successful at home and on the job had come to an agreement with their spouses about child and house care and were able to compartmentalize their lives. He also cited research showing that women who take the minimum maternity leave stay on par with their male peers, while women who take six months or more off earn roughly 60% as much as men.

“If she works up to it and takes a short leave, she’ll be good,” Branson says. “I don’t think it will impact her performance.”

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I think that pregnancy matters! I believe that every baby matters. I think that we as a society need to value moms that stay home to raise their family. We should not be giving them so much pressure to stay in the work force no matter what. Read my post: Does Pregnancy Matter? http://www.thelostapron.com/2012/07/does-pregnancy-matter.html

Wow! Ms Mayer need do no more to establish her credentials as a risk-taker!

There are many things that could be said; here are three:

First, it takes a woman to bear a child, but a ‘village’ to raise one. If there are other loving, reliable adults in the child’s life, it matters less if his mother is not by his side constantly. In particular, if Mayer’s work commitments lead to her son’s father taking the primary role in his care, this could be a very good thing. Having a father who is involved in his life is of immense benefit to a growing boy. Nobody who watched the coverage of the aftermath of the Tour de France could fail to be moved by the close bond between winner Bradley Wiggins and his young son Ben.

Second, what a wonderful time to be working for Yahoo! Mayer’s important dual role will give her every disincentive to micro-manage her subordinates and every incentive to grow them in their own skills and styles. This will benefit the company too, as employees give fully of themselves without the need always to be ‘watching their backs’.

Third, my advice to Ms Mayer would be this: sustain your breastfeeding relationship with your son as long as possible. Those early weeks and months expressing your milk for his total or principal food supply are crucial for his nutritional and immunological foundations. And time spent pumping at work need not be down time. It could be time to study important documents safe in the knowledge that nobody will disturb you without very good reason! Over the later months and ideally first few years, after a tough day at the office dealing with difficult people and situations, nothing will give you quite as good a boost as feeling the total adoration of the child at your breast.